Music reviews in plain English.

Christine and the Queens: Chris

Christine’s last album garnered good reviews but we never got it. We assumed the critics either lucked out — most time “critically praised” means “poor sales and disappears” — or we missed the point, because this new album is wonderful (… at least until we saw the last one sold 1m copies. What do we know? )

Héloïse Letissier, aka Christine, has now adopted the persona Chris, who appears to be a cool 80s disco chick and she’s added a chunk of that warm Prince sound to her previously — to our ears — rather cold tunes of the first album.

Other reviews say that sex is a major topic (rude words are in Spanish) but this is a family newspaper (and we’ve not got the lyrics anyway). So the music: sometimes the funk of Prince, other times the pop of Michael Jackson, or more modern electric pop. She’s got a good voice, too.

The opening songs Comme ci, the super-catchy Girlfriend are pop, as is 5 Dollars, probably the poppiest track on the album. In places it does get a bit bland and slips by your ears but it’s a fine soul/funk/pop album. Try Girlfriend or Goya Soda.